Dairy

Background

The dairy industry includes dairy farmers and manufacturers, like Land O'Lakes butter and Mayfield Ice Cream. Lobbying spending by the dairy industry has fluctuated over the years, but has trended upward. Lobbying doubled from 2003 to 2013, from $4 million to $8 million. Contributions, meanwhile, have grown from about $3 million to $5 million over the course of the last three presidential elections.

Dairy lovers might be surprised to learn that some familiar brands are highly partisan in their political giving. Sargento Cheese donated all of its political dollars to Republicans, approximately $143,000. In contrast, Stoneyfield Farm gave 100 percent of its contributions, about $106,000, to Democrats, making the company an anomaly in the top 10. Most dairy donors swayed Republican, while a few split between parties.

Lobbying reports show that the farm bill has been a top priority for the dairy industry. All of the big players in the dairy industry lobbied on Agriculture Reform, Food and Jobs Act of 2013 ("farm bill"), including the International Dairy Foods Association, the top diary lobbyist in 201 at $1,730,000. Some of the most politically active organizations in the dairy industry also lobbied on an immigration overhaul. The Dairy Farmers of America, which spent $1,059,000 on lobbying in 2013, filed eight lobbying reports than mentioned its support for the Senate's "Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act," making it one of the most active groups lobbying on that issue.

Lobbying reports also suggest a widespread interest in a bevy of smaller, less political bills specific to the dairy industry, like the Dairy Income Fairness Act and the Dairy Freedom Act, two different approcahes to controlling dairy supply and providing a safery net to farmers.

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